


Будапешт

by zombie_socks



Category: Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Clint Feels, Kid Fic, Past Miscarriage, Tony Being Tony, some language Steve would probably not approve of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-17
Updated: 2014-07-17
Packaged: 2018-02-09 04:59:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,686
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1969896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zombie_socks/pseuds/zombie_socks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Almost a decade ago, Natasha Romanov abandoned her team and was found working once more for Red Room. Everyone felt betrayed, especially a certain archer. </p>
<p>When an eight-year-old kid shows up at Avengers mansion, claiming to be Clint's son, no one is sure what to do. And when the kid claims his mother had been shot and with dying breath told the boy to go find his father at Avenger's Mansion, Clint starts to get suspicious. It's only when he sees a word written on the boy's arm that he begins to piece things together. And what he finds flips his world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Будапешт

**Author's Note:**

> Unbetaed.  
> Sorry.  
> Also, I do not own the characters (except the original one).  
> Enjoy!

Будапешт

The knock at the door became even more prevalent the moment JARVIS alerted the group to it. They were used to the AI interrupting to bring them news, whether it be an alien attack on Manhattan or the pizza boy from Ray’s on 11th. Jan volunteered to answer it as an excuse to escape the boring meeting Tony was holding. She hated meetings: all talk, no action. She dodged a looked from Clint whose eyes told her that he was just as bored as she was. Tony said the meetings were designed to keep the team as a unit, informed on each other. And while it may have been necessary, it didn’t make it any less sufferable for the more action-inclined.

            She made her way to the large front door with a frown on her lips as a thought chased her from the meeting room. _Clint didn’t always mind taking a break from moving._ She knew the reason it pulled down on her features. It hurt her too. Widow’s disappearance, her betrayal, had hit them all in a different way. But Clint… well it hit him the hardest. He’d taken off three months just to get his head back in order. And he hadn’t ever truly returned. They had Hawkeye back, but Clint Barton was left somewhere else in the world.

Like most of them, he’d buried himself in work, in saving other people. And he hadn’t stopped digging. Not even after eight years.

She opened the heavy wooden door to the mansion, looked left, then right, and saw no one.

“Those kids better not be ding-dong-ditching us again,” she murmured before shutting the door. She turned around and that’s when she saw him.

He was small, young, a grade school kid. His red-gold hair was sticking up on the back of his head and hanging ungracefully in his grey eyes. He smiled up at her in a lopsided grin.

She folded her arms over her chest. “Look, kid, no autographs right now.”

His grin only faded by a degree. “I’m not here for that, Miss Janet, ma’am.”

Well at least he was polite. And cute. She couldn’t resist. “Okay, you got me. What are you here for then, big guy?”

He took on a nervous air then. His small foot traced circles on the marble floor. “Well, I came to see my dad.”

Jan’s brows narrowed. “Your dad?” She shook her head. “Sorry, kid, but you have the wrong place, I’m afraid. Now,” she opened the door, “why don’t you go back home before your mommy misses you.” She hated breaking his heart, but it wasn’t the first time some kid had shown up at their door, working an angle to get in to see them. It was kind of admirable, but also annoying. And dangerous. They didn’t exactly have the safest occupation.

He just stood there, though, completely unmoving as if the outside was another dimension that he was scared to death to enter. A single tear slid down on his cheek and he viciously wiped it away.

Jan broke. “Hey, hey, it’s okay. What’s wrong, sweetie?”

She took him into her arms and he sobbed harder. “I’m sorry, Miss Janet, I-I…” but his tears came harder. “I didn’t know what else to do.”

She gently held him out at arms length. “What do you mean?”

“Mom’s dead. The man in the suit took me to the orphanage on seventh this morning. But I knew I didn’t belong there. I kept trying to tell him to take me to my dad, but he wouldn’t listen and-”

“What’s going on, Jan?” Tony inquired. Him and the rest of the team were in the lobby. Janet stood up, keeping her hand in the boy’s.

“I’m not sure, Tony.” She glanced at the kid. “He says he’s looking for his dad.”

“He wants us to help him find him?” Steve asked.

She opened her mouth to say something but then looked down at the little boy whose hand she held. He was staring straight ahead. His eyes were wide and fixed on the group. No, not the group. On one particular member.

In an instant his hand left hers and he ran towards the archer, flinging his young arms around the man’s middle. “Dad!”

Clint stood there shocked as the kid’s head rested against his abs. He could feel the moisture of the boy’s earlier tears seeping in through his T-shirt. His arms stayed midway between being folded over his chest and wrapping around the clinging child.

“Something you want to tell us, Barton?” Tony quipped. The futurist’s propensity for light behavior was lost on the archer. He was far too confused to notice it.

“Clint?” Steve asked, resting a hand on the man’s shoulder.

It was like the contact woke him up at last. He placed both of his large, calloused hands on the kid’s shoulders and separated them. “Sorry, kid, but I’m not your dad. I don’t know who-”

“No, no. You are, you have to be. Mom wouldn’t have lied to me. Not in the hospital like that.” He was sobbing again.

The archer wasn’t buying it. He dropped his hands from the kid and the pair just stood there.

“What’s your name, son?” Steve gently inquired, appalled that Clint could just let this kid cry in front of him. 

The boy wiped his eyes and nose on his shirtsleeve. “Barney. But everyone calls me Barn.” He kept his gaze on the floor now. Clint’s fists balled and then relaxed. Still to this day, the name of his brother bubbled up a reaction from him.

“And your mom. What was her name?”

“Tara.” His little lower lip quivered. “She was shot. The man called her a bad word and then shot her.” His eyes glazed over, recalling the scene. “There was blood everywhere. I called the police and they took her to the hospital. But it was too late. She only got a few words out.” His gaze fell on the archer again. “She said to go find Dad. She told me where to go.”  

Jan had been studying the boy and his possible paternal parent. She could definitely see similarities. The intensity of the eyes was a noticeable shared trait as well as the build, the shape of the face. It would not surprise her if this kid was Clint’s son. And the name, Barn. Clint’s brother’s name. If this was some kind of scam, it was a damn good one. Not everyone knew the horrible story of Clint and his brother, of the unfortunate, terrible accident.

“Sorry, kid,” Clint mumbled. “But I don’t know a Tara.” He turned, leaving the lobby.

Janet knew she had to act fast. Clint was not going to claim this kid. There was still the possibility that the child wasn’t his, but she wasn’t going to send the boy back to the orphanage based on an untested theory. And she knew neither would he.

“Clint, they sent him to an orphanage on seventh.”

It got the archer to halt. She prayed it would get him to turn around.

Even with his back turned the crew could tell he was struggling. His childhood had been in an abusive home and then in an orphanage where he was starved and beaten, picked on by other kids. But that meant nothing when it came to his brother. Barney had been distant the entire time, only acknowledging his younger sibling when they decided to run away to the circus.

And then it had all crashed in a single moment many years later as Clint’s arrow found his brother’s chest…

“Clint?” she tried again.

The archer rubbed at the back of his neck before turning and whispering something to Tony. The genius nodded.

“Okay, kid. You’re going to come with Jan and me for a little bit.”

The boy nodded, but his eyes kept glancing over at the archer who was now vanishing down the hall.

Steve Rogers stood there a moment. He followed the boy, Jan, and Tony with his eyes until they turned a corner, then he went after Clint.

“What’s wrong with you?” he began to the man’s back. “Is that really how you treat a-”

“Okay, Captain Righteous, you have a son show up at the door and see how you react!” He really didn’t need Steve on his ass about his behavior. He knew what the team wanted, a warm embrace and assurance that he’d handle the situation. But he couldn’t do that. He no longer had that capability. Not after Nat…

He felt the stabbing pain in his chest rise up again. It was worse this time, stirred up by the possibility that had graced his mind. The kid was the right age, the look. And his story sounded very, well, Natasha. 

But could she really have gone eight years without telling him they had a kid?

Steve softened a bit. “Look, Clint. You of all people can’t plan to throw him out on the street. You know what its like more than any of us.”

“Yeah. It sucks, man. It’s a nightmare. You don’t have to remind me; he doesn’t have to remind me. I lived it. And no, I won’t make that kid live it either.”

“So what’s your plan?”

Typical Captain America: the man with a plan. _Well not all of us have that ability, Cap. Or privilege._ Hawkeye shrugged. “If he’s not mine, I’ll do anything in my power to find him a good home, to get him adopted.”

“And if he is yours?”

But the archer went silent. He knew what Steve wanted him to say. He knew the reality of it was that he couldn’t take in a kid, not with what they did on a daily basis. He knew the weight of that reality, of what it would mean if he had a son with Nat and if in her last hours she’d sent him to him. It was her way of saying sorry for not telling him and for simultaneously asking him to take care of their kid for her. She’d failed and was begging for him to do better than she had.

But he couldn’t do that. Not anymore. The last feeling in his heart had left with her on the stormy night when she’d slipped from their bed only to reappear as an agent working for Red Room once more. If she’d carried their child in her the night they attacked the underground Russian organization…

“If he is mine,” the Hawk answered, “then I’ll do the same thing. I’m sorry, Cap. I know that isn’t what you want to hear. But it’s the best option. For everybody.”

 

Clint stood next to Tony as they poured over the results. The desk lit up with charts and colors that made Tony shake his head.

“Sorry, Clint. But the DNA’s a perfect match. Fifty percent you, fifty percent Natasha.”

Clint nodded slowly, biting his lip and letting that reality settle over him. He had a son. An eight-year-old son whose mother had betrayed them all and left him in the middle of the night. And now the mother was supposedly dead.

That hit harder than he was expecting. He’d told himself for nearly a decade if Nat died, he would feel nothing. She had made him that way. But now, staring at the hovering holographic image of his son and realizing how off the world had been for eight years, he let the emotions fighting inside him exist.

“What’s the play, man?” Tony asked quietly.

Clint sighed. “We can’t take him in, Tony; you know that. Not with what we do. The kid would constantly be in danger. And I don’t need his death on my hands.” It was harsh sounding. But it covered up the sensation of loss and confusion that was clouding up in his mind.

“Clint,” Tony began quietly, “look, I get it. Widow messed you up. Hell, she messed us all up. And I know this is sudden and scary as hell, man, but don’t let that make your decision for you. It’s obvious you still care about her. You wouldn’t have missed that shot that night if you hadn’t.”

Clint’s eyes narrowed. “Everyone’s gonna miss a shot, Tony. It happens.”

“Yeah, but not you. You never miss.” A playful spark made its way into the inventor’s eyes. “As made apparent by that kid in there.”

Clint glared daggers and went to join Jan and the kid in the rec room.

 

Jan was in love. She adored this kid who had wandered onto their doorstep. She wanted to say it was just because he was new and cute and sweet, but her mind told her it was so much deeper than that.

She’d never forgiven herself for it. She knew she should have told Hank what had happened to them, the wonderful thing that had happened. But she had been scared. It was so strange to realize, to understand, that inside her was another human being, growing and forming. That in nine months her and Hank would have a third member of their two-person sub-group.

But she had kept it silent. And when she fell to the ground during that mission so many years ago, well, the third member had fallen with her. She lost the baby and that created a gap in her that could never be filled. She fought with Hank almost constantly following that because of both the child she never told him about and because of his own behavior. And then he left. He stormed out leaving her alone. So she relied heavily on the other team members in those days. And as calloused as Natasha had been, she’d offered the most support. Jan told her about the lost baby and about the fights and the changes in Hank. The spy had listened, taken it all in, and offered what little comfort she could. It was enough for Janet.

Then Widow betrayed the team, stole the light out of Clint’s eyes, and destroyed what little solace Janet had found. The one other person who knew the whole story about her and Hank’s break-up had sold them out. She took it personally, felt injured. But then she’d seen the hollow shell that used to be the archer. She’d never realized just how deeply he’d loved the little Russian redhead.

And now a part of Nat had come back to them. He was small and young and innocent. She felt protective of him. The idea that Clint might not take him in killed her. She needed his kid. She needed the chance to make up for the sin she’d committed so long ago. She wanted this chance to do it over. And she wanted the spark that had been robbed from Clint’s sharp eyes to return. This child could do that.

“I win!” Barn exclaimed happily, staring with joy at the collection of cards before him.

Janet smirked. Even though the game was just Go Fish, the kid’s ability to manipulate cards was impressive. _Oh, he’s definitely yours, Clint_.

The door opened and the archer walked in. Barn looked up and his smile faded to something neutral and heartbreaking. Clint managed a half smile back before turning to Jan. “Can I talk to you a sec?”

She stood up telling Barn to set the game up for another round. “We’ll be right back.”

Out in the hall she prepared herself to persuade Barton. She wanted this kid to stay and she knew how good it would be if he did. For her and the archer. She folded her arms over her chest. “Well?”

“He’s mine. And Nat’s.” The second part had been an afterthought, a painful addition.

She smiled wide. “Clint, that’s great! You have a son. You have someone-”

“Jan, stop. Okay? Just…” he collapsed his face into his hands. “Look, I want to be happy about this. I want to be excited and everything, like everybody else. But I can’t. Jan…” he couldn’t even put it into words. So he backed up and switched tracks. “Why didn’t she tell me?”

Jan closed her eyes a second. That was one she could answer. “She was probably too scared.”

“Do you think she knew when she left?” He was searching and Wasp could see that.

She swallowed hard. “Clint, that’s probably why she left.”    

Pieces, old and new, fell into place with a horrible snap. She felt sorry for the archer whose reality was being twisted before him. She couldn’t imagine the pain he was feeling; the woman he loved had given birth to their son eight years ago and he was just now finding out about it. Old wounds, new salt.

“You should talk to him,” she suggested, trying to keep a hint of a smile in it. She wanted him to be happy about this like she was. She wanted Barn to stay here so she could have a steady reminder of good moments before her and Hank fell apart. She wanted Clint’s unraveled reality to mirror her alternate one.

A whisper came from the archer, “Do you really think she’d dead?”

“Find out.” It was all she could respond.

It seemed that Clint was the only one who remembered the kid’s story. Was Nat really shot? Had none of them felt anything from that? Maybe not. Maybe they had sanitized their minds too much for Natasha Romanov to make any impact anymore.

Clint stepped into the rec room and sat down across from his son. Barn looked up at him with innocent, intense eyes. They were a beautiful color and brightly lit, like Nat’s used to be.

“Barn,” he started quietly.

The kid just stared at him.

“You said your mom was shot?”

He nodded slowly and fought the tears rimming his eyes.

“I know it’s tough, but, can you walk me through it? Tell me exactly what happened?” He needed the details. He needed the story. This kid was his and everyone was expecting him to keep him like some lost puppy. But this was a kid! His kid! He had no qualifications for raising a son. And he still had too much remnant of a heart to let the kid go into foster care or an orphanage. He knew too much about those places.

Barn ran his shirtsleeve over his face. “Someone knocked on the door and I went to hide in the bedroom closet like I always do. Mommy told me it was to keep me safe because bad guys were after us. I figured it would just be our neighbor, Miss Rickets, who had been coming all week to make sure we were moved in okay. She was kind of annoying but I liked the cookies she brought. All I heard was a guy yell a bad word and then a loud bang. Mommy screamed for me to go out the back. The fire escape stairs were scary, but Mommy had told me they would keep me safe. So I went down to the first floor and then ducked into the window like she’d told me to do.  I waited and waited for her to show up but she didn’t. I was scared so I went back up the steps to check on her and that’s when I saw all the blood. She saw me in the doorway and told me to call the police.”

“And this was this morning?”

Barn shook his head. “Yesterday. This morning the guy in the suit picked me up from Miss Rickets and took me to the orphanage.”

“Where you ran away?”

He nodded. “I snuck out and came here like Mommy told me to before…” He got really quiet and this time the tears slid down his cheeks. He tried to wipe them away but new ones took the place of those that he managed to whisk away.

Clint got up and slid in next to him, putting his arm around the child that was his. He’d never get used to that, to the small warm body that fit in his arm and nestled against his side.

“Barn. Did the guy in the suit give you his name? Who he worked for?”

The kid shook his head and tried harder to stifle his tears. He didn’t want the strong man his mother had often talked about thinking he was weak. He wanted to impress the archer, make him want to keep him.

The hair on the back of Clint’s neck stood on end. Something wasn’t adding up. The police that took Nat to the hospital would have called an ambulance. They would have made sure Barn had somewhere to go. They would have contacted him before they took Barn to an orphanage; surely his name was on the birth certificate…if there was one. Knowing Nat she would have been able to keep her and Barn’s identities a careful secret. But there were too many holes.

That’s when he saw it. It was faint and smeared from tears, but on Barn’s forearm, below his sleeve was ink. Clint pushed the sleeve and saw the remains of a written word. “Where’d you get this, Barn?”

“Mommy wrote it on me. She said to show it to you if you needed…um…con-fort-mate…um?”

“Confirmation?”

“Yeah.”

Clint studied the Russian lettering. The off feeling to the air increased as the word became visible. Confirmation. Not that Barn was his son, but of what was happening. Or, at least, about to.

“Barn, listen to me. I’m going to go and check out the apartment where your mom was shot, okay. Do you think you could point it out on a map?”

The kid nodded, happy to be acknowledged by the man he’d been told was his father.

“Okay. But when I leave, I need you to stay here. Okay? You’re safe here and I need you to be safe. Got it?”

Again his head bobbed with understanding.

“Okay.” Clint took his ID card from his pocket and activated the map function. A holograph hovered over the specialized plastic and Barn’s eyes went wide in wonder. Clint smiled at that and then asked the kid to point to the street where he and Nat had been staying. A small finger selected Granger St. in the Bronx.

“Apartment 317 in the Harper building.” The kid was sharp.

“Got it. Thanks. He stood up and Barn followed right at his heels. Jan was still outside the door and Clint told Barn to stay with her until he got back.

“Where are you going?” she asked almost panicked.

“Just to check some stuff out. I’ll be back.” He cast a glance at his son and grinned, hoping the kid wouldn’t catch the scent that something was incredibly off.

 

There was police tape on the door and in front of it. But Clint wasn’t interested in the crime scene; he was interested in what led up to it. Nat had always been extremely careful – an element she’d extended to their son. She’d kept him safe for years. And now she gets shot standing in the doorframe? No way.

He ducked below the yellow tape and inside the apartment. It was small but homey. And new. Boxes had yet to be unpacked. _So you just got back to New York_ , Clint thought. _Did trouble follow you, Nat? Or did you run headfirst into it?_

He cleared every room first, making sure they were empty. Satisfied that they were, he tucked the Glock back into the back of his waistband and searched around. He found Barn’s room and took notice of the scarce number of boxes on the floor. _Moved a lot_ , he added mentally. Then again, that was the life of a spy. He opened the nearest box and peered inside. It was clothes mostly, a few toys: model cars and planes, a dartboard.

But down along the side there was a loose picture. He held it up, the moonlight illuminating the glossy surface. The image showed him and Nat, his arm around her waist and her gaze on him. They were smiling. The archer couldn’t remember who had taken the picture or when it had been captured. But it was nice…. and one of the few that had ever come into existence. He dropped the picture into his jacket pocket, closed the box back up, and told himself to come back later to get the kid’s things.

He checked spots he knew Nat would hide things. Despite her leaving, they still had been partners for years and he was aware of her tactics. Sure enough he found a Glock under the coffee table in the living room and a pistol on the inside of the dinnerware cabinet in the kitchen. _She had defenses. Why didn’t she use them?_ He shook his head. _What’s going on, Nat?_

He began to leave when he saw it. Any other individual would have missed it. But it was clue meant for him and him alone. Faintly carved into the counter’s surface was a word he’d already seen earlier that night. He understood then.

He heard a rustle by the main door and ducked into the pantry, keeping the door open a crack so he could see out. Silhouetted by the light of the hall, a man entered. He had a gun hanging loosely at his side and in his other hand he carried a radio. The man cleared each room just as Clint had and when he came back to the kitchen, Clint heard him. “All clear, sir. No tape. That bitch must’ve hidden it elsewhere.”

This was the guy. Or maybe just a goon. Either way, Clint had heard enough.

He kicked open the pantry door; it hit the guy in the head, knocking him off balance. Clint countered with a right hook to the man’s jaw and swift follow-through to his gut. A hit to his kneecap sent the man crumbling to the floor.

Pulling back on his short hair, Clint demanded, “Who do you work for?”

“Piss off, bro.” The accent was Russian. _Not a good sign._

A hit to the gut. “I asked you a question.”

“And I said piss off.”

Clint brought out the gun from his waistband and pushed it into the guy’s temple.

“Okay, okay. Relax, bro.”

_Typical goon. Once you add a little heat, they squeal._

“Name’s Petrovich.”

“What does he want with the woman who lives here?” He was treading carefully. He had to play angles, see how much this guy knew without giving anything away.

“Widow has recording of Petrovich killing Ukrainian scum. Petrovich wants tape and Widow. Wants to kill her himself.”

“Well send a message back to Petrovich. If he wants the Widow, he’s going to have to go dig up her body and plant a bullet hole through mine. Got it? I beat him to it. I offed that bitch and he can go fuck himself. Understand?”

The goon nodded and Clint lowered the gun, picking up the radio where the guy had dropped it on the floor along with the man’s gun. He emptied the chamber and clip before tossing it back on the ground. “Now get the hell out of New York.”    

Clint left, circled the parking lot, and then settled on a bench in the adjacent park. His eyes trained on the window on the third floor behind the fire escape.

He felt her there before he heard her. Her presence was so undeniable.

“Glad you got the message,” she stated, settling next to him on the bench with a pained moan. The gunshot wound had been stitched up but still hurt like hell.

“Pretty damn clever, Nat, using that word.” But he was still upset with her, with all that had happened. He wanted answers. “Why didn’t you tell me about our son?”

She sighed heavily. “Do you have any idea how many times I wanted to? Clint, I thought about telling you almost every night. I wanted to so badly. But I had to keep him safe. And that meant keeping him a secret, even from you.”

“So what changed?”

“Petrovich was more connected than I realized. Things got too complicated, too… compromised. And I’m afraid they’ll only get worse.”

“So you need me to take Barn,” he drew from her implication.

“I know it’s sudden and everything. I really didn’t want you to find out like this.”

“But you were going to tell me someday?” He doubted, sounding much ruder than he intended.

Nat nodded, turning her green gaze onto him. “Yes. Clint, I promise you, one day I’ll explain everything: why I had to leave, why you found me with Red Room, and everything in between that shot and now.”

His grey eyes finally met hers. “That shot?”

“The one you missed.”

“I never miss, Nat.”

“I know.” It brought a smile to her full lips. Clint couldn’t resist then. He leaned in and kissed her softly, tentatively. Part of his mind still said this was a trap. But as her lips responded to his, he understood that he was only caught in her web once more. He’d been there before and didn’t really mind the return. They kissed a moment longer before she pulled away gently.  

“You realize you have to go back to hating me after this,” she remarked, studying the light returning to his eyes.

“I’m sure I will. But I’ll also never stop loving you, Nat.”

She smiled at him and pressed her mouth to his again. “Take care of our son for me.”

She stood up, ready to leave again, to take his heart with her once more.

“I got him,” he responded, standing up and taking her hand. “But only if you promise you’ll come back some day.”

She kissed his cheek before whispering, “I promise.”

“Be careful, Nat.”

One last kiss before she went off into the darkness.

 

The heroes were finishing up dinner when he came back. Their faces showed a range of emotion. The only smile came from Barn.

“Everything okay?” Janet asked.

The archer nodded. “Yeah.” He turned to his son and knelt down to his height. “You’re safe now, Barn.”

The kid smiled and rolled up his sleeve. “So the confirmation worked?”

Clint grinned. “It worked.”

Jan caught sight of the scribbled word on the kid’s forearm. “What’s it mean?” she inquired.

“It means the kid stays.” Clint stood up, keeping a hand on his son’s head and tousling his hair a little. 

Jan was beaming; Tony grinned, and Steve simply nodded in approval. But after the meal, after everyone else was in bed asleep, Rogers sought out Barton and asked him what he’d been suspecting.

“Natasha’s still alive, isn’t she?”

Clint bowed his head. “You heard the kid, Cap. She was shot and died in the hospital.”

The super soldier didn’t really buy it. “So what does the word on Barn’s arm mean?”

The archer tilted his head from side to side, debating. “Budapest. It’s a code word. Nat and I would use it when either one of us needed to ask the other a favor.”   

“And that’s what changed your mind?”

He shrugged. “I just needed to clear my head, Cap. That word helped.” He paused a moment before going on, “Look, Barn’s my son. And I’ll do anything to keep him safe. But believe me, Cap, when I say I’m going to need help. Nat didn’t exactly leave this world with a clean slate. There’s a bit of a mess still that I’ll eventually have to take care of. And I understand that not everyone’s going to want to help; she did still sell us out, betray us all and-”

Cap put up a hand to stop him. “Everyone should get a second chance, Clint. Barn is both Natasha’s and yours. You’ve got my support and I know you have Jan’s. She hasn’t left that kid alone since he got here.”

Clint grinned at that.

“You don’t have to do this alone, Clint. We’ll help you.”

“Thanks, Cap. Night.”

“Night.”

Clint opened the door to find Barn playing with the archer’s dartboard on the opposite wall. He watched as the kid let loose a needle sharp dart and hit a little short of the bull’s-eye. 

“Your elbow’s too low,” he instructed.

His son turned to him and handed him a dart. “Show me?”

Clint sized up the dart in his hand, felt the familiar weight. He lined up the target and flicked his wrist, sending the dart flying. It hit in the exact center and Barn’s eyes lit up.

“Can you teach me that?” He was shaking with excitement.

Clint crouched down to his level and looked him in the eyes. “Absolutely. But tomorrow, okay. You need to go to sleep now.”

The kid frowned in disappointment but nodded understandingly. Barn hugged the man before him and smiled wide as he felt strong arms enfold him. He wasn’t sure what had changed his father’s mind, but he knew it was connected to the odd word on his arm. He’d seen that word before, but hadn’t understood the strange lettering. But his father had, and it had convinced him to keep him.

Clint pushed away gently and fished out the photo from his jacket pocket. “So you don’t forget her,” he said.

The kid shoved away some of the tears threatening his eyes. “I miss her.”

“Me too, Barn. Me too.”

He took his son’s hand and led him to the adjoining room. “We’ll get your stuff tomorrow,” he commented distantly. They were both too transfixed on the photo to really notice much more.

Barn set it down on the table beside his bed and curled up under the sheets. “Night, Dad.”

“Good night, Barn.” He turned off the light and went back to his own room. He poured a drink and stared out the window. He saw it then: a flicker of red in the bushes below. He raised his glass slightly. “Good night, Nat.”     

 

 

 

         

 

    


End file.
